He is also not Dutch, which brings me to the thread title. We are discussing him in the AZ thread though.
So apparently Marco thinks that Gouweleeuw is a midfielder and that's why he is on the bench.. Wth Marco! stop fu**ing around and put that kid on the field and win something dammit! “Ik ben een centrale verdediger. Natuurlijk moet ik mijn defensieve taken vervullen, maar ik kan ook opbouwen. Als ik me alleen ga bezighouden met verdedigen, dan speel ik niet naar mijn kwaliteiten” - Jeffrey Gouweleeuw
so Heerenveen extended his contract so he could sit on the bench rather than be an important player for some other team. I could understand not playing him at CB because he's the most qualified player to play DM, but to simply not play him at all because he can play DM is insane. He's still a better defender than kruiswijk or Zomer.
Maybe Gouweleeuw needs this kick under the butt. He needs to become defensively harder. Jonge Juffrouw. The real drama for me is taking place at Feyenoord. Vilhena and Achahbar are side tracked for Immers and Pele. Castaignos scenario is luring. Raiola the Rat is the new agent of Vilhena. And where the hell is Manu after that great goal against Heerenveen last year?
That's never a good sign. However I wonder; does Raiola convince these players to move abroad too early, or do the players simply hire him to make it happen once they decide for themselves that they want to make a big move?
I have seen him in an interview say before Narsingh moved to PSV that he did not believe in a step up in the Netherlands for development reasons. He argued that a player could get injured tomorrow and insinuated that when he would have made the step to say ... Fulham ..., he would have been financially more secure.
not sure how true this is, but if it is, FdB needs to STFU: http://blogs.bettor.com/Frank-de-Bo...can-step-in-at-the-full-back-position-a186983 Just because he screwed him over at Ajax by playing him at fullback, doesn't mean he has to give Newcastle similar ideas. Of course the other part of the problem is that Anita appears all too willing to stunt his development as a DM by filling in at fullback. If he wants to get called up to Oranje (and I'm assuming that's a part of why he moved abroad) then he needs to make the DM position his.
No, it is how society works. Risk in the 'risk society' is always looming so prepare to reap some money.
I thought you meant the bit with Immers against the goalkeeper, which is at the 20 second mark Didn't even see the Clasie pass, very nice.
Robben was lively for Bayern. Not direct involved in the 2 goals, but made key passes, created chances and also had general presence by roaming over the field. Afellay was pretty anonymous. When he came on with another player, Bayern had a very long spell of dominance. Huntelaar was always gonne Huntelaar vs Bayern, being the flat track bully that he is. Not scoring against a top team. Yes but he was also not assisted? No that is what you get against top teams. You actually need all hands on deck to do play football. With Huntelaar you play with 10 men. I do think Draxler could have passed the ball one time to Huntelaar, but choose not to. VDV 2 assists. The second one was still hard for the goal scorer, but VDV's pass did beat a man for him. The first assist was very good, as the goal scorer only needed to tap the goal in. Bruma did not play in the game. Ron Vlaar's defense conceded 4 goals today. I saw the first 2 and he did not look clean on the first goal. I will see later how he has done overall. Good to hear vdW plays a full game for PSG. Dost did also play a full game for Wolfsburg, but did not score today. They played 1-1 against Greuther Furth, with a goal from Olic.
RVP had a bad game for United as he had a bad game in the CL. That's due to himself and the team. As I only care for RVP self I will focus first on that. RVP was not keeping the ball well to himself. If he tried to turn out of a situation, he slipped or was pushed away easily. This does not create tranquility in the team. He dropped a time later in the second half and his long ball distribution was off. In the CL Nani one time gave him a good pass and he had another "unable to control moment" like against Denmark that is inexcusable. He is not agressive enough in holding the ball or winning long balls hooved forward, but too agressive in his tackles when dropping. His tackle today was a red card IMO. Not 2 feet, but if his opponents leg was fixated to the ground, his ankle would lay somewhere in the second ring. In CL he also had a stupid tackle to "show off" his commitment. A cross ball did not reach the free standing Valencia at the other side. Some things were not to bad. With defense situations in the box, he is of value at times. Against Hungary for us he heads balls away, as he did for United 1 or 2 times. At the start of this game he changed maybe even the direction of a dangerous ball and at another time he kicked a ball away from a corner. He also had 1 maybe 2 good combinations. 1 particular good one with Kagawa, when he set up an attack. Though his penalty was touched by the keeper, there were so many minutes to build up nerves. I am cutting him slack and say that under those conditions, many players have failed before. Generally speaking, the longer a player has to wait, the bigger the advantage for the keeper. The team of United lacks in a serious way. First of all Kagawa is freezing out RVP from the team. He does not pass back in a combination or passes when he goes deep. This is a problem. He also needs to get RVP involved and RVP is not involved, however he bites with RVP like Sneijder bites. RVP needs quick players with a vertical gameplay as repertoire. Kagawa is more horizontal and dropping when he is forced to defend, though primarily he roams horizontal. He is more dynamic than Sneijder and this means he does have his vertical moments or intentions. then you think that this game style of Kagawa will lead to deep going wingers that will cross, but that does not happen either. I have not seen 1 good counter even in 45 minuted played against 10 men. The wingers and backs never crossed. Carrick is no Song with his over the top through passes. Tried it 1 time, but was off. Scholes can do this, but does not. The team of United is full of "me first" players. Nani, Hernandez took his shot rather than going for the combination. Kagawa also loses his passing game near the box and wants to go for own success. This is a problem. I love this struggle United faces. We have it with Sneijder and ask ourselves "where is RVP in this game?". United is now facing the same problem to some extend. The solution for Dutch NT is Afellay behind Sneijder. Hernandez with RVP is also maybe already a bit better as he makes space for RVP. Maybe that Welbeck behind RVP is a solution. He surprised me with his speed 1 time and also looks like a player able to beat a man maybe. RVP must play striker as he is poor on the wing and also on 10, unlike many people think. He takes to much time on the ball and that goes at the cost of the speed of the game. All in all, RVP has a problem and the win against Galatasaray and Liverpool only disguise it. Maybe Kagawa has a problem, when SAF is more inclined to let RVP function optimal. We will see.
So Kagawa tends to move horizontally without much dynamics ('diepgang' in Dutch) and is near the box a poor passer too. What is the added value of Kagawa? He would struggle in any set-up, but maybe I misunderstood you. If I do, my sincere apologies.
I think Kagawa is very dynamic (much more than Sneijder, who is more sur place glory pass giver often IMO), but indeed misses the quality to really go 1 vs 1 and the speed for a vertical run, initiating a counter so RVP can do his synchronizing with the running man (this is where RVP shines). Kagawa is a monster of a passer all over the field, but when he sniffs the chance of getting a goal, he loses his eagerness to combine or deliver the final pass and goes for his own success too often IMO. If this has to do with wanting to impress for United as he is new or this being Kagawa's thing, I do not know. Last year in Bundesliga he scored 13 goals and had 8 assists. From that stat, it could be the case of the last option. When he snifs his chance he wants to score as he wants to end up in the season above 10 goals. When he is not able to score in his own opinion, he is also able to assist with some good passing here and there. However all this means more bad news for RVP, as Kagawa never passes to him on a run. In essence he must deal with own glory go-ers. Kagawa, Nani, Hernandez. Valencia is maybe his only partner in this team first thinking, but that player can't cross through the air. He rams the ball hard over the ground into the box and RVP can only hope it lands somewhere close to him. It's really amazing he has already scored 5 goals for United, but I do not see music in the patterns that could deliver fruit for RVP to pick on in cycles of let's say 30 minutes per game. RVP is frozen out of a match and I do not see perspective in him being successful on the long run if he does not get more involved into the game by his fellow players. Until now he is beating the odds, but odds have a way to get into accordance with reality when the samples get bigger.